2007 Dodge Nitro

3 Defect Investigations from the NHTSA

NHTSA Defect Investigations for the 2007 Dodge Nitro

The Office of Defects Investigations (ODI) is an office within the NHTSA which investigates serious safety problems in the design, construction or performance of vehicles.
The NHTSA is authorized to order manufacturers to recall and repair vehicles, if the ODI finds a safety issue.
NHTSA investigations for the 2007 Dodge Nitro, both ongoing and closed, are listed below:

Summary: In a letter dated August 21, 2014, the Center for Auto Safety (CAS) petitioned the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) to initiate a defect investigation into failures associated with the Totally Integrated Power Module (TIPM) installed in Chrysler SUVs, trucks, and vans beginning in the 2007 model year. The CAS alleges that TIPM failures have resulted in incidents of engine stall; airbag non-deployment; random horn, headlight, taillight, door lock, instrument panel and windshield wiper activity; failure of fuel pump shutoff resulting in unintended acceleration; and fires. The petition includes a list of 70 complaints received by CAS that are allegedly related to Chrysler TIPM failures.The petition references a class action lawsuit regarding TIPM7 module failure and 63 of the CAS complaints relate to vehicles equipped with TIPM7 body control modules (1 complaint involves a vehicle equipped with a TIPM6 module and 6 complaints involve vehicles that were not equipped with TIPM modules).This defect petition review will focus on vehicles equipped with TIPM7 modules.Preliminary analysis of the 63 CAS complaints related to TIPM7 equipped vehicles identified 51 reports alleging incidents of engine stall (17) or no-start (34). Three complaints reported incidents of smoke (2) or fire (1). None of the reports provided alleged TIPM failures resulting in airbag non-deployment or unintended acceleration and none of the complaints alleged a crash. In a supplement to the petition, CAS identified 24 crashes from NHTSA's Early Warning Reporting (EWR) database that it believes may be related to TIPM failure and requested that NHTSA review these as part of its petition evaluation. In a September 3, 2014 letter, Chrysler Group LLC notified NHTSA of a safety defect in the Totally Integrated Power Module-7 (TIPM 7) in approximately 188,723 MY 2011 Dodge Durango and Jeep Grand Cherokee vehicles equipped with 3.6L and 5.7L engines (Recall 14V-530). According to Chrysler, some Jeep Grand Cherokee and Dodge Durango vehicles may experience a failure in the fuel pump relay within the TIPM which can result in a no-start or stall condition.Thirty-six (36) of the complaints submitted with the petition involve MY 2011 Jeep Grand Cherokee and Dodge Durango vehicles equipped with 3.6L and 5.7L engines.The petition will be evaluated for a grant or deny decision. A copy of the petition will be placed in the public file (NHTSA Ref. No. 10637920).

Summary: On July 3, 2007, DaimlerChrysler corporation (DCC) submitted a defect information report to NHTSA describing a defect that could result in engine stall while driving in approximately 80,894 model year (MY) 2007 Jeep Wrangler and Dodge Nitro vehicles manufactured between January 30, 2006 and January 22, 2007 (NHTSA recall 07V-291, DCC recall G25).according to DCC, the totally integrated power module (tipm) in these vehicles was programmed with software that may allow the engine to stall under certain conditions.DCC will reprogram the tipm in the recalled vehicles with revised software. ODI opened PE07-027 on May 29, 2007, based on 53 complaints alleging engine stall and/or loss of electrical power in MY 2007 Jeep Wrangler vehicles.ODI was also monitoring similar complaints in MY 2007 Dodge Nitro vehicles.DCC's analysis of complaints to DCC and NHTSA found that many described events with a momentary loss of electrical power inside the vehicle and a corresponding loss of engine power.many of the reports also indicated that the instrument cluster telltale lamps momentarily illuminated during the event. DCC's engineering analysis determined that the tipm could initiate an internal reset cycle lasting approximately 75 ms in response to error messages on the communication bus.the "key on" signal from the tipm to the powertrain control module (PCM) is lost during a tipm reset.if the PCM loses the "key on" signal for longer than 40 ms, it interprets it as the vehicle ignition being turned off and begins a power down routine.after the tipm reset, the "key on" signal is restored and the PCM powers back up.if the rotating components of the engine contain sufficient inertia, the vehicle may restart with no input from the operator as reported in some of the complaints.if the engine does not restart in this manner, it can be restarted by the operator.a revision to the tipm software on January 22, 2007 changed the tipm reset time to 17 ms, removing the potential for PCM power down and engine stall. ODI has received 178 complaints potentially related to the alleged defect in MY 2007 Jeep Wrangler vehicles and 52 complaints involving MY 2007 Dodge Nitro vehicles.two of the Nitro complaints allege that a crash resulted from an engine stall incident, one of which caused minor injuries to a passenger.as of June 1, 2007, DCC identified 151 Wrangler complaints and 128 Nitro complaints. This investigation has been closed with DCC's recall.

Summary: The agency, particularly in recent months, has been informed of incidents involving allegations of personal injury and death claimed to have been caused by safety defects and failures to conform to minimum Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standards (FMVSS) on rental car vehicles for which a safety recall to remedy the safety defect or noncompliance had allegedly not been performed prior to the rental car company's lease of the vehicle.NHTSA understands that there is presently a petition before the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) seeking to prohibit at least one rental car company from renting vehicles on which safety recall campaign remedies remain outstanding.The purpose of this audit query (AQ) is to investigate recall remedy completion by rental car companies on the above-listed safety recall campaigns.These campaigns were chosen due to their inclusion of vehicles used in the rental market.This information is expected to provide the agency an indication of how completely and how quickly rental car fleets, in general or individually, perform necessary recall-related repairs or other remedies on the vehicles owned and then leased for use on the roadways.This AQ is opened.

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